Or  I  Z  W  i> 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

OF 

JAMES  ABRAM  GARFIELD 


A  MEMORIAL  ADDRESS, 

Delivered  before  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  February  27,  1882. 


BY  JAMES  G.  BLAINE, 

EX-SECRETARY  OF  STATE. 


Introductory  Note.— After  the  first  sorrow  for  President  Garfield’s  death  was  somewhat 
modified  by  time,  what  may  be  called  the  formal  sorrow  of  the  people  began  to  seek  a  more 
elaborate  expression.  It  was  felt  to  be  fitting  that  the  nation,  as  such,  by  her  highest  repre¬ 
sentative  body,  should,  by  some  suitable  memorial  services,  commemorate  the  life  and  death 
of  the  late  honored  Chief  Magistrate.  Very  soon  after  the  opening  of  Congress,  in  December 
of  1881,  various  resolutions  were  introduced,  looking  to  a  formal  observance  in  memory  of 
the  dead.  After  considerable  discussion,  the  27th  of  February,  1882,  was  fixed  upon  as  the 
memorial  dayt  and  ex-Secretary  Blaine  was  chosen  as  speaker  to  pronounce  a  suitable  eulogy 
on  the  life  and  character  of  Garfield.  The  occasion  was  one  of  the  utmost  state  and  solem¬ 
nity.  There  were  present,  besides  the  two  Houses  of  Congress,  the  President  and  his  Cabinet, 
the  ministers  resident  of  foreign  powers,  the  generals  of  the  army  and  commanders  of  the 
navy,  and  hundreds  of  the  most  distinguished  men  and  women  in  America.  The  orator  and 
the  eulogy  itself  were  in  keeping  with  the  occasion,  and  it  has  been  deemed  appropriate  by 
the  publishers  to  append  to  the  Life  and  Work  of  Garfield  the  full  text  of  Mr.  Blaine’s 
oration,  which  here  follows.— J.  C.  R. 

Mr.  President  : — For  the  second  time  in  this  generation  the  great  depart¬ 
ments  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States  are  assembled  in  the  Hall  of 
Representatives  to  do  hon<^|o  the  memory^jf  a  murdered  President.  Lin¬ 
coln  fell  at  the  close  of  a  mighty  struggle,  in  which  the  passions  of  men  had 
been  deeply  stirred.  The  tragical  termination  of  his  great  life  added  but 
another  to  the  lengthened  succession  of  horrors  which  had  marked  so  many 
lintels  with  the  blood  of  the  first  born.  Garfield  was  slain  in  a  day  of  peace, 
when  brother  had  been  reconciled  to  brother,  and  when  anger  and  hate  had 
been  banished  from  the  land.  “  Whosoever  shall  hereafter  draw  the  portrait 
of  murder,  if  he  will  show  it  as  it  has  been  exhibited  where  such  example 
was  last  to  have  been  looked  for,  let  him  not  give  it  the  grim  visage  of 
Moloch,  the  brow  knitted  by  revenge,  the  face  black  with  settled  hate.  Let 

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LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GAEFIELD. 


him  draw,  rather,  a  decorous,  smooth-faced,  bloodless  demon;  not  so  much  an 
example  of  human  nature  in  its  depravity  and  in  its  paroxysms  of  crime,  as 
an  infernal  being,  a  fiend  in  the  ordinary  display  and  development  of  his 
character.” 

From  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims  at  Plymouth  till  the  uprising  against 
Charles  I.,  about  twenty  thousand  emigrants  came  from  old  England  to' New- 
England.  As  they  came  in  pursuit  of  intellectual  freedom  and  ecclesiastical 
independence  rather  than  for  worldly  honor  and  profit,  the  emigration  nat¬ 
urally  ceased  when  the  contest  for  religious  liberty  began  in  earnest  at  home. 
The  man  who  struck  his  most  effective  blow  for  freedom  of  conscience  by 
sailing  for  the  colonies  in  1620  would  have  been  accounted  a  deserter  to  leave 
after  1640.  The  opportunity  had  then  come  on  the  soil  of  England  for  that 
great  contest  which  established  the  authority  of  Parliament,  gave  religious 
freedom  to  the  people,  sent  Charles  to  the  block,  and  committed  to  the  hands 
of  Oliver  Cromwell  the  supreme  executive  authority  of  England.  The  En¬ 
glish  emigration  was  never  renewed,  and  from  these  twenty  thousand  men, 
with  a  small  emigration  from  Scotland  and  from  France,  are  descended  the 
vast  numbers  who  have  New  England  blood  in  their  veins. 

In  1685  the  revocation  of  the  edict  of  Nantes,  by  Louis  XIV.,  scattered  to 
other  countries  four  hundred  thousand  Protestants,  who  were  among  the 
most  intelligent  and  enterprising  of  French  subjects — merchants  of  capital, 
skilled  manufacturers,  and  handicraftsmen,  superior  at  the  time  to  all  others 
in  Europe.  A  considerable  number  of  these  Huguenot  French  came  to  Amer¬ 
ica;  a  few  landed  in  New  England  and  became  honorably  prominent  in  its 
history.  Their  names  have,  in  large  part,  become  Anglicized,  or  have  disap¬ 
peared,  but  their  blood  is  traceable  in  many  of  the  most  reputable  families, 
and  their  fame  is  perpetuated  in  honorable  memorials  and  useful  insti¬ 
tutions. 

From  these  two  sources,  the  English-Puritan  and  the  French-Huguenot, 
came  the  late  President ;  his  father,  Abraham  Garfield,  being  descended  from 
the  one,  and  his  mother,  Eliza  Ballou,  from  the  other. 

It  was  good  stock  on  both  sides — none  better,  none  braver,  none  truer. 
There  was  in  it  an  inheritance  of  courage,  of  manliness,  of  imperishable  love 
of  liberty,  of  undying  adherence  to  principle.  Garfield  was  proud  of  his 
blood ;  and,  with  as  much  satisfaction  as  if  he  were  a  British  nobleman  read¬ 
ing  his  stately  ancestral  record  in  Burke’s  Peerage,  he  spoke  of  himself  as 
ninth  in  descent  from  those  who  would  not  endure  the  oppression  of  the  Stu¬ 
arts,  and  seventh  in  descent  from  the  brave  French  Protestants  who  refused  to 
submit  to  tyranny  even  from  the  Grand  Monarque. 

General  Garfield  delighted  to  dwell  on  these  traits ;  and  during  his  only  visit 
to  England  he  busied  himself  in  discovering  every  trace  of  his  forefathers  in 
parish  registries  and  on  ancient  army  rolls.  Sitting  with  a  friend,  in  the  gal- 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


675 


lery  of  the  House  of  Commons,  one  night,  after  a  long  day’s  labor  in  this  field 
of  research,  he  said,  with  evident  elation,  that  in  every  war  in  which,  for  three 
centuries,  patriots  of  English  blood  had  struck  sturdy  blows  for  constitutional 
government  and  human  liberty,  his  family  had  been  represented.  They  were 
at  Marston  Moor,  at  Naseby,  and  at  Preston ;  they  were  at  Bunker  Hill,  at 
Saratoga,  and  at  Monmouth,  and  in  his  own  person  had  battled  for  the  same 
great  cause  in  the  war  which  preserved  the  Union  of  the  States. 

Losing  his  father  before  he  was  two  years  old,  the  early  life  of  Garfield  was 
one  of  privation,  but  its  poverty  has  been  made  indelicately  and  unjustly 
prominent.  Thousands  of  readers  have  imagined  him  as  the  ragged,  starving 
child,  whose  reality  too  often  greets  the  eye  in  the  squalid  sections  of  our 
large  cities.  General  Garfield’s  infancy  and  youth  had  none  of  their  destitu¬ 
tion,  none  of  their  pitiful  features  appealing  to  the  tender  heart  and  to  the 
open  hand  of  charity.  He  was  a  poor  boy  in  the  same  sense  in  which  Henry 
Clay  was  a  poor  boy;  in  which  Andrew  Jackson  was  a  poor  boy  ;  in  which 
Daniel  Webster  was  a  poor  boy ;  in  the  sense  in  which  a  large  majority  of  the 
eminent  men  of  America,  in  all  generations,  have  been  poor  boys.  Before  a 
great  multitude  of  men,  in  a  public  speech,  Mr.  Webster  bore  this  testimony: 

“  It  did  not  happen  to  me  to  be  born  in  a  log-cabin,  but  my  elder  brothers 
and  sisters  were  born  in  a  log-cabin  raised  amid  the  snow  drifts  of  New 
Hampshire,  at  a  period  so  early  that  when  the  smoke  rose  first  from  its  rude 
chimney,  and  curled  over  the  frozen  hills,  there  was  no  similar  evidence  of  a 
white  man’s  habitation  between  it  and  the  settlements  on  the  rivers  of  Canada. 
Its  remains  still  exist.  I  make  to  it  an  annual  visit.  I  carry  my  children  to 
it  to  teach  them  the  hardships  endured  by  the  generations  which  have  gone 
before  them.  I  love  to  dwell  on  the  tender  recollections,  the  kindred  ties,  the 
early  affections,  and  the  touching  narratives  and  incidents  which  mingle  with 
all  I  know  of  this  primitive  family  abode.” 

With  the  requisite  change  of  scene  the  same  words  would  aptly  portray 
the  early  days  of  Garfield.  The  poverty  of  the  frontier,  where  all  are  engaged 
in  a  common  struggle  and  where  a  common  sympathy  and  hearty  co-operation 
lighten  the  burdens  of  each,  is  a  very  different  poverty— different  in  kind, 
different  in  influence  and  effect— from  that  conscious  and  humiliating  indi¬ 
gence  which  is  every  day  forced  to  contrast  itself  with  neighboring  wealth 
on  which  it  feels  a  sense  of  grinding  dependence.  The  poverty  of  the  frontier 
is  indeed  no  poverty.  It  is  but  the  beginning  of  wealth,  and  has  the  bound¬ 
less  possibilities  of  the  future  always  opening  before  it.  No  man  ever  grew 
up  in  the  agricultural  regions  of  the  West  where  a  house-raising,  or  even  a 
corn-husking,  is  matter  of  common  interest  and  helpfulness,  with  any  other 
feeling  than  that  of  broad-minded,  generous  independence.  This  honorable 
independence  marked  the  youth  of  Garfield  as  it  marks  the  youth  of  millions 
of  the  best  blood  and  brain  now  training  for  the  future  citizenship  and  future 
government  of  the  republic.  Garfield  was  born  heir  to  land,  to  the  title  of 


676 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


freeholder  which  has  been  the  patent  and  passport  of  self-respect  with  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race  ever  since  Hengist  and  Horsa  landed  on  the  shores  of  Eng¬ 
land.  His  adventure  on  the  canal — an  alternative  between  that  and  the 
deck  of  a  Lake  Erie  schooner — was  a  farmer  boy’s  device  for  earning  money, 
just  as  the  New  England  lad  begins  a  possibly  great  career  by  sailing  before 
the  mast  on  a  coasting-vessel  or  on  a  merchantman  bound  to  the  Farther  India 
or  to  the  China  Seas. 

No  manly  man  feels  any  thing  of  shame  in  looking  back  to  early  struggles 
with  adverse  circumstances,  and  no  man  feels  a  worthier  pride  than  when  he 
has  conquered  the  obstacles  to  his  progress.  But  no  one  of  noble  mould 
desires  to  be  looked  upon  as  having  occupied  a  menial  position*  as  having 
been  repressed  by  a  feeling  of  inferiority,  or  as  having  suffered  the  evils  of 
poverty  until  relief  was  found  at  the  hand  of  charity.  General  Garfield’s 
youth  presented  no  hardships  which  family  love  and  family  energy  did  not 
overcome;  subjected  him  to  no  privations  which  he  did  not  cheerfully  accept ; 
and  left  no  memories  save  those  which  were  recalled  with  delight  and  were 
transmitted  with  profit  and  with  pride. 

Garfield’s  early  opportunities  for  securing  an  education  were  extremely 
limited,  and  yet  were  sufficient  to  develop  in  him  an  intense  desire  to  learn. 
He  could  read  at  three  years  of  age,  and  each  winter  he  had  the  advantage 
of  the  district  school.  He  read  all  the  books  to  be  found  within  the  circle 
of  his  acquaintance:  some  of  them  he  got  by  heart.  While  yet  in  childhood 
he  was  a  constant  student  of  the  Bible,  and  became  familiar  with  its  litera¬ 
ture.  The  dignity  and  earnestness  of  his  speech  in  his  maturer  life  gave  evi¬ 
dence  of  this  early  training.  At  eighteen  years  of  age  he  was  able  to  teach 
school,  and  thenceforward  his  ambition  was  to  obtain  a  college  education.  To 
this  end  he  bent  all  his  efforts,  working  in  the  harvest  field,  at  the  carpenter’s 
bench,  and,  in  the  winter  season,  teaching  the  common  schools  of  the  neigh¬ 
borhood.  While  thus  laboriously  occupied  he  found  time  to  prosecute  his 
studies,  and  was  so  successful,  that  at  twenty-two  years  of  age  he  was  able  to 
enter  the  junior  class  at  Williams  College,  then  under  the  Presidency  of  the 
venerable  and  honored  Mark  Hopkins,  who,  in  the  fullness  of  his  powers,  sur¬ 
vives  the  eminent  pupil  to  whom  he  was  of  inestimable  service. 

The  history  of  Garfield’s  life  to  this  period  presents  no  novel  features.  He 
had  undoubtedly  shown  perseverence,  self-reliance,  self-sacrifice,  and  ambition 
—qualities  which,  be  it  said  for  the  honor  :>f  our  country,  are  everywhere  to 
be  found  among  the  young  men  of  America.  But  from  his  graduation  at 
Williams  onward  to  the  hour  of  his  tragical  death,  Garfield’s  career  was  emi¬ 
nent  and  exceptional.  Slowly  working  through  his  educational  period,  re¬ 
ceiving  his  diploma  when  twenty-four  years  of  age,  he  seemed  at  one  bound 
to  spring  into  conspicuous  and  brilliant  success.  Within  six  years  he  was 
successively  President  of  a  college,  State  Senator  of  Ohio,  Major-General  of 
the  Army  of  the  United  States,  and  Representative  elect  to  the  National 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


677 


Congress.  A  combination  of  honors  so  varied,  so  elevated,  within  a  period  so 
brief,  and  to  a  man  so  young,  is  without  precedent  or  parallel  in  the  history 
of  the  country. 

Garfield’s  army  life  was  begun  with  no  other  military  knowledge  than  such 
as  he  had  hastily  gained  from  books  in  the  few  months  preceding  his  march 
to  the  field.  Stepping  from  civil  life  to  the  head  of  a  regiment,  the  first  order 
he  received  when  ready  to  cross  the  Ohio  was  to  assume  command  of  a  bri¬ 
gade,  and  to  operate  as  an  independent  force  in  Eastern  Kentucky.  His 
immediate  duty  was  to  check  the  advance  of  Humphrey  Marshall,  who  was 
marching  down  the  Big  Sandy  with  the  intention  of  occupying,  in  connection 
with  other  Confederate  forces,  the  entire  territory  of  Kentucky,  and  of  pre¬ 
cipitating  the  State  into  secession.  This  was  at  the  close  of  the  year  1861. 
Seldom,  if  ever,  has  a  young  college  professor  been  thrown  into  a  more  em¬ 
barrassing  and  discouraging  position.  He  knew  just  enough  of  military 
science,  as  he  expressed  it  himself,  to  measure  the  extent  of  his  ignorance, 
and  with  a  handful  of  men  he  was  marching,  in  rough  winter  weather,  into  a 
strange  country,  among  a  hostile  population,  to  confront  a  largely  superior 
force,  under  the  command  of  a  distinguished  graduate  of  West  Point,  who  had 
seen  active  and  important  service  in  two  preceding  wars. 

The  result  of  the  campaign  is  matter  of  history.  The  skill,  the  endurance, 
the  extraordinary  energy  shown  by  Garfield,  the  courage  he  imparted  to  his 
men,  raw  and  untried  as  himself,  the  measures  he  adopted  to  increase  his 
force,  and  to  create  in  the  enemy’s  mind  exaggerated  estimates  of  his  num¬ 
bers,  bore  perfect  fruit  in  the  routing  of  Marshall,  the  capture  of  his  camp, 
the  dispersion  of  his  force,  and  the  emancipation  of  an  important  territory 
from  the  control  of  the  rebellion.  Coming  at  the  close  of  a  long  series  of  dis¬ 
asters  to  the  Union  army,  Garfield’s  victory  had  an  unusual  and  extraneous 
importance,  and  in  the  popular  judgment  elevated  the  young  commander  to 
the  rank  of  a  military  hero.  With  less  than  2,000  men  in  his  entire  com¬ 
mand,  with  a  mobilized  force  of  only  1,100,  without  cannon,  he  had  met  an 
army  of  5,000  and  defeated  them — driving  Marshall’s  forces  successively  from 
two  strongholds  of  their  own  selection,  fortified  with  abundant  artillery. 
Major-General  Buell,  commanding  the  Department  of  the  Ohio,  an  ex¬ 
perienced  and  able  soldier  of  the  regular  army,  published  an  order  of  thanks 
and  congratulation  on  the  brilliant  result  of  the  Big  Sandy  campaign,  which 
would  have  turned  the  head  of  a  less  cool  and  sensible  man  than  Garfield. 
Buell  declared  that  his  services  had  called  into  action  the  highest  qualities  of 
a  soldier ;  and  President  Lincoln  supplemented  these  words  of  praise  by  the 
more  substantial  reward  of  a  brigadier-general’s  commission,  to  bear  date 
from  the  day  of  his  decisive  victory  over  Marshall. 

The  subsequent  military  career  of  Garfield  fully  sustained  its  brilliant  be- 
ginning.  With  his  new  commission,  he  was  assigned  to  the  command  of  a 
brigade  in  the  Army  of  the  Ohio,  and  took  part  in  the  second  and  decisive 


678 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


day’s  fight  in  the  great  battle  of  Shiloh.  The  remainder  of  the  year  1862  was 
not  especially  eventful  to  Garfield,  as  it  was  not  to  the  armies  with  which  he 
was  serving.  His  practical  sense  was  called  into  exercise  in  completing  the 
task,  assigned  him  by  General  Buell,  of  reconstructing  bridges  and  re-establish¬ 
ing  lines  6f  railway  communication  for  the  army.  His  occupation  in  this 
useful  but  not  brilliant  field  was  varied  by  service  on  court-martials  of  im¬ 
portance,  in  which  department  of  duty  he  won  a  valuable  reputation,  attracting 
the  notice  and  securing  the  approval  of  the  able  and  eminent  Judge  Advocate- 
General  of  the  Army.  That  of  itself  was  warrant  to  honorable  fame;  for 
among  the  great  men  who  in  those  trying  days  gave  themselves,  with  entire 
devotion,  to  the  service  of  their  country,  one  who  brought  to  that  service  the 
ripest  learning,  the  most  fervid  eloquence,  the  most  varied  attainments,  who 
labored  with  modesty  and  shunned  applause,  who  in  the  day  of  triumph  sat 
reserved  and  silent  and  grateful — as  Francis  Deak  in  the  hour  of  Hungary’s 
deliverance — was  Joseph  Holt,  of  Kentucky,  who  in  his  honorable  retirement 
enjoys  the  respect  and  veneration  of  all  who  love  the  Union  of  the  States. 

Early  in  1863  Garfield  was  assigned  to  the  highly  important  and  responsible 
post  of  chief-of-staff  to  General  Rosecrans,  then  at  the  head  of  the  Army  of 
the  Cumberland.  Perhaps  in  a  great  military  campaign  no  subordinate  officer 
requires  sounder  judgment  and  quicker  knowledge  of  men  than  the  chief-of- 
staff  to  the  commanding  general.  An  indiscreet  man  in  such  a  position  can 
sow  more  discord,  breed  more  jealousy,  and  disseminate  more  strife,  than  any 
other  officer  in  the  entire  organization.  When  General  Garfield  assumed  his 
new  duties  he  found  various  troubles  already  well  developed  and  seriously 
affecting  the  value  and  efficiency  of  the  Army  of  the  Cumberland.  The 
energy,  the  impartiality,  and  the  tact  with  which  he  sought  to  allay  these  dis¬ 
sensions  and  to  discharge  the  duties  of  his  new  and  trying  position  vyill  always 
remain  one  of  the  most  striking  proofs  of  his  great  versatility.  His  military 
duties  closed  on  the  memorable  field  of  Chickamauga,  a  field  which,  however 
disastrous  to  the  Union  arms,  gave  to  him  the  occasion  of  winning  imperish¬ 
able  laurels.  The  very  rare  distinction  was  accorded  him  of  a  great  promotion 
for  his  bravery  on  a  field  that  was  lost.  President  Lincoln  appointed  him  a 
major-general  in  the  Army  of  the  United  States  for  gallant  and  meritorious 
conduct  in  the  battle  of  Chickamauga. 

The  Army  of  the  Cumberland  was  reorganized,  under  the  command  of 
General  Thomas,  who  promptly  offered  Garfield  one  of  its  divisions.  He  was 
extremely  desirous  to  accept  the  position,  but  was  embarrassed  by  the  fact 
that  he  had,  a  year  before,  been  elected  to  Congress,  and  the  time  when  he 
must  take  his  seat  was  drawing  near.  He  preferred  to  remain  in  the  military 
service,  and  had  within  his  own  breast  the  largest  confidence  of  success  in  the 
wider  field  which  his  new  rank  opened  to  him.  Balancing  the  arguments  on 
the  one  side  and  the  other,  anxious  to  determine  what  was  for  the  best,  de¬ 
sirous  above  all  things  to  do  his  patriotic  duty,  he  was  decisively  influenced 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


679 


by  the  advice  of  President  Lincoln  and  Secretary  Stanton,  both  of  whom  as¬ 
sured  him  that  he  could,  at  that  time,  be  of  especial  value  in  the  House  of 
Representatives.  He  resigned  liis  commission  of  major-general  on  the  5th  day 
of  December,  1863,  and  took  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Representatives  on  the 
7th.  He  had  served  two  years  and  four  months  in  the  army,  and  had  just 
completed  his  thirty-second  year. 

The  Thirty-eighth  Congress  is  pre-eminently  entitled  in  history  to  the  desig¬ 
nation  of  the  War  Congress.  It  was  elected  while  the  war  was  flagrant,  and 
every  member  was  chosen  upon  the  issues  involved  in  the  continuance  of  the 
struggle.  The  Thirty-seventh  Congress  had,  indeed,  legislated  to  a  large  extent 
on  war  measures,  but  it  was  chosen  before  any  one  believed  that  secession  of 
the  States  would  be  actually  attempted.  The  magnitude  of'  the  work  which 
fell  upon  its  successor  was  unprecedented,  both  in  respect  to  the  vast  sums  of 
money  raised  for  the  support  of  the  army  and  navy,  and  of  the  new  and  ex¬ 
traordinary  powers  of  legislation  which  it  was  forced  to  exercise.  Only 
twenty-four  States  were  represented,  and  182  members  were  upon  its  roll. 
Among  these  were  many  distinguished  party  leaders  on  both  sides,  veterans  in 
the  public  service,  with  established  reputations  for  ability,  and  with  that  skill 
which  comes  only  from  parliamentary  experience.  Into  this  assemblage  of 
men  Garfield  entered  without  special  preparation,  and  it  might  almost  be  said 
unexpectedly.  The  question  of  taking  command  of  a  division  of  troops  under 
General  Thomas,  or  taking  his  seat  in  Congress,  was  kept  open  till  the  last  mo¬ 
ment — so  late,  indeed,  that  the  resignation  of  his  military  commission  and  his 
appearance  in  the  House  were  almost  contemporaneous.  He  wore  the  uniform 
of  a  major-general  of  the  United  States  army  on  Saturday,  and  on  Monday, 
in  civilian’s  dress,  he  answered  to  the  roll-call  as  a  Representative  in  Congress 
from  the  State  of  Ohio.  X 

He  was  especially  fortunate  in  the  constituency  which  elected  him.  Des¬ 
cended  almost  entirely  from  New  England  stock,  the  men  of  the  Ashtabula 
district  were  intensely  radical  on  all  questions  relating  to  human  rights.  Well 
educated,  thrifty,  thoroughly  intelligent  in  affairs,  acutely  discerning  of 
character,  not  quick  to  bestow  confidence,  and  slow  to  withdraw  it,  they  were 
at  once  the  most  helpful  and  most  exacting  of  supporters.  Their  tenacious 
trust  in  men  in  whom  they  have  once  confided  is  illustrated  by  the  unparal¬ 
leled  fact  that  Elisha  Whittlesey,  Joshua  R.  Giddings,  and  James  A.  Garfield 
represented  the  district  for  fifty-four  years. 

There  is  no  test  of  a  man’s  ability  in  any  department  of  public  life  more 
severe  than  service  in  the  House  of  Representatives ;  there  is  no  place  where 
so  little  deference  is  paid  to  reputation  previously  acquired,  or  to  eminence 
won  outside ;  no  place  where  so  little  consideration  is  shown  for  the  feelings 
or  the  failures  of  beginners.  What  a  man  gains  in  the  House  he  gains  by 
sheer  force  of  his  own  character;  and  if  he  loses  and  falls  back  he  must  expect 
no  mercy,  and  will  receive  no  sympathy.  It  is  a  field  in  which  the  survival 


680 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


of  the  strongest  is  the  recognized  rule,  and  where  no  pretense  can  deceive  and 
no  glamour  can  mislead.  The  real  man  is  discovered,  his  worth  is  impartially- 
weighed,  his  rank  is  irreversibly  decreed. 

With  possibly  a  single  exception,  Garfield  was  the  youngest  member  in 
the  House  when  he  entered,  and  was  but  seven  years  from  his  college  gradua¬ 
tion.  But  he  had  not  been  in  his  seat  sixty  days  before  his  ability  was  re¬ 
cognized  and  his  place  conceded.  He  stepped  to  the  front  with  the  confidence 
of  one  who  belonged  there.  The  House  was  crowded  with  strong  men  of  both 
parties;  nineteen  of  them  h$ve  since  been  transferred  to  the  Senate,  and 
many  of  them  have  served  with  distinction  ill  the  gubernatorial  chairs  of 
their  respective  States,  and  on  foreign  missions  of  great  consequence ;  but 
among  them  all  none  grew  so  rapidly,  none  so  firmly  as  Garfield.  As  is  said 
by  Trevelyan  of  his  parliamentary  hero,  Garfield  succeeded  “  because  all  the 
world  in  concert  could  not  have  kept  him  in  the  background ;  and  because, 
when  once  in  the  front,  he  played  his  part  with  a  prompt  intrepidity  and  a 
commanding  ease  that  were  but  the  outward  symptoms  of  the  immense  re¬ 
serves  of  energy,  on  which  it  was  in  his  power  to  draw.”  Indeed  the  appar¬ 
ently  reserved  force  which  Garfield  possessed  was  one  of  his  great  character¬ 
istics.  He  never  did  so  well  but  that  it  seemed  he  could  easily  have  done 
better.  He  never  expended  so  much  strength  but  that  he  seemed  to  be  hold¬ 
ing  additional  power  at  call.  This  is  one  of  the  happiest  and  rarest  distinc¬ 
tions  of  an  effective  debater,  and  often  counts  for  as  much  in  persuading  an 
assembly  as  the  eloquent  and  elaborate  argument. 

The  great  measure  of  Garfield’s  fame  was  filled  by  his  service  in  the  House 
of  Representatives.  His  military  life,  illustrated  by  honorable  performance, 
and  rich  in  promise,  was,  as  he  himself  felt,  prematurely  terminated,  and 
necessarily  incomplete.  Speculation  as  to  what  he  might  have  done  in  a  field 
where  the  great  prizes  are  so  few  can  not  be  profitable.  It  is  sufficient  to  say 
that,  as  a  soldier,  he  did  his  duty  bravely ;  he  did  it  intelligently ;  he  won  an 
enviable  fame,  and  he  retired  from  the  service  without  blot  or  breath  against 
him. 

As  a  lawyer,  though  admirably  equipped  for  the  profession,  he  can 
scarcely  be  said  to  have  entered  on  its  practice.  The  few  efforts  he  made  at 
the  bar  were  distinguished  by  the  same  high  order  of  talent  which  he  exhib¬ 
ited  on  every  field  where  he  was  put  to  the  test ;  and  if  a  man  may  be  ac¬ 
cepted  as  a  competent  judge  of  his  own  capacities  and  adaptations,  the  law 
was  the  profession  to  which  Garfield  should  have  devoted  himself.  But  fate 
ordained  otherwise,  and  his  reputation  in  history  will  rest  largely  upon  his 
service  in  the  House  of  Representatives.  That  service  was  exceptionally  long. 
He  was  nine  times  consecutively  chosen  to  the  House,  an  honor  enjoyed  by 
not  more  than  six  other  Representatives  of  the  more  than  5,000  who  have 
been  elected  from  the  organization  of  the  government  to  this  hour. 

As  a  parliamentary  orator,  as  a  debater  on  an  issue  squarely  joined,  where 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


681 


the  position  has  been  chosen  and  the  ground  laid  out,  Garfield  must  be 
assigned  a  very  high  rank.  More,  perhaps,  than  any  man  with  whom  he  was 
associated  in  public  life,  he  gave  careful  and  systematic  study  to  public 
questions,  and  he  came  to  every  discussion  in  which  he  took  part  with  elabo¬ 
rate  and  complete  preparation.  He  was  a  steady  and  indefatigable  worker. 
Those  who  imagine  that  talent  or  genius  can  supply  the  place  or  achieve  the 
results  of  labor  will  find  no  encouragement  in  Garfield’s  life.  In  preliminary 
work  he  was  apt,  rapid,  and  skillful.  He  possessed,  in  a  high  degree,  the 
power  of  readily  absorbing  ideas  and  facts,  and,  like  Dr.  Johnson,  had  the  art 
of  getting  from  a  book  ail  that  was  of  value  in  it  by  a  reading  apparantly  so 
quick  and  cursory  that  it  seemed  like  a  mere  glance  at  the  table  of  contents. 
He  was  a  pre-eminently  fair  and  candid  man  in  debate,  took  no  petty  advan¬ 
tage,  stooped  to  no  unworthy  methods,  avoided  personal  allusions,  rarely  ap¬ 
pealed  to  prejudice,  did  not  seek  to  influence  passion.  He  had  a  quicker  eye 
for  the  strong  point  of  his  adversary  than  for  his  weak  point,  and  on  his  own 
*  side  he  so  marshaled  his  weighty  arguments  as  to  make  his  hearers  forget  any 
possible  lack  in  the  complete  strength  of  his  position.  He  had  a  habit  of 
stating  his  opponent’s  side  with  such  amplitude  of  fairness  and  such  liberality 
of  concession  that  his  followers  often  complained  that  he  was  giving  his  case 
away.  But  never  in  his  prolonged  participation  in  the  proceedings  of  the 
House  did  he  give  his  case  away,  or  fail  in  the  judgment  of  competent  and 
impartial  listeners  to  gain  the  mastery. 

These  characteristics,  which  marked  Garfield  as  a  great  debater,  did  not, 
however,  make  him  a  great  parliamentary  leader.  A  parliamentary  leader,  as 
that  term  is  understood  wherever  free  representative  government  exists,  is 
necessarily  and  very  strictly  the  organ  of  his  party.  An  ardent  American 
defined  the  instinctive  warmth  of  patriotism  when  he  oftered  the  toast :  “  Our 
country  always  right;  but  right  or  wrong,  our  country.”  The  parliamentary 
leader  who  has  a  body  of  followers  that  will  do  and  dare  and  die  for  the  cause, 
is  one  who  believes  his  party  always  right ;  but  right  or  wrong,  is  for  his  party. 
No  more  important  or  exacting  duty  devolves  upon  him  than  the  selection 
of  the  field  and  the  time  for  contest.  He  must  know  not  merely  how  to 
strike,  but  where  to  strike,  and  when  to  strike.  He  often  skillfully  avoids  the 
strength  of  his  opponent’s  position  and  scatters  confusion  in  his  ranks,  by  at¬ 
tacking  an  exposed  point  when  really  the  righteousness  of  the  cause  and  the 
strength  of  logical  intrenchment  are  against  him.  He  conquers  often  both 
against  the  right  and  the  heavy  battalions;  as  when  young  Charles  Fox,  in 
the  days  of  his  Toryism,  carried  the  House  of  Commons  against  justice, 
against  its  immemoral  rights,  against  his  own  convictions,  and  in  the  interest 
of  a  corrupt  administration,  in  obedience  to  a  tyrannical  sovereign,  drove 
Wilkes  from  the  seat  to  which  the  electors  of  Middlesex  had  chosen  him  and 
installed  Luttrell  in  defiance,  not  merely  of  law,  but  of  public  decency.  For 
an  achievement  of  that  kind  Garfield  was  disqualified — disqualified  by  the 


682 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GAKFIELD. 


texture  of  his  mind,  by  the  honesty  of  his  heart,  by  his  conscience,  and  by 
every  instinct  and  aspiration  of  his  nature. 

The  three  most  distinguished  parliamentary  leaders  hitherto  developed  in 
this  country  are  Mr.  Clay,  Mr.  Douglas,  and  Mr.  Thaddeus  Stevens.  Each 
was  a  man  of  consummate  ability,  of  great  earnestness,  of  intense  personality, 
differing  widely,  each  from  the  others,  and  yet  with  a  signal  trait  in  common 
— the  power  to  command.  In  the  give  and  take  of  daily  discussion,  in  the  art 
of  controlling  and  consolidating  reluctant  and  refractory  followers ;  in  the 
skill  to  overcome  all  forms  of  opposition,  and  to  meet  with  competency  and 
courage  the  varying  phases  of  unlooked-for  assault  or  unsuspected  defection, 
it  would  be  difficult  to  rank  with  these  a  fourth  name  in  all  our  Congressional 
history.  But  of  these  Mr.  Clay  was  the  greatest.  It  would,  perhaps,  be  im¬ 
possible  to  find  in  the  parliamentary  annals  of  the  world  a  parallel  to  Mr. 
Clay  in  1841,  when  at  sixty-four  years  of  age  he  took  the  control  of  the 
Whig  party  from  the  President  who  had  received  their  suffrages,  against  the 
power  of  Webster  in  the  Cabinet,  against  the  eloquence  of  Choate  in  the 
Senate,  against  the  herculean  efforts  of  Caleb  Cushing  and  Henry  A.  Wise 
in  the  House.  In  unshared  leadership,  in  the  pride  and  plenitude  of  power, 
he  hurled  against  John  Tyler,  with  deepest  scorn,  the  mass  of  that  con¬ 
quering  column  which  had  swept  over  the  land  in  1840  and  drove  his  ad¬ 
ministration  to  seek  shelter  behind  the  lines  of  his  political  foes.  Mr.  Doug¬ 
las  achieved  a  victory  scarcely  less  wonderful,  when,  in  1854,  against  the  se¬ 
cret  desires  of  a  strong  administration,  against  the  wise  counsel  of  the  older 
chiefs,  against  the  conservative  instinct,  and  even  the  moral  sense  of  the 
country,  he  forced  a  reluctant  Congress  into  a  repeal  of  the  Missouri  compro¬ 
mise.  Mr.  Thaddeus  Stevens,  in  his  contests  from  1865  to  1868,  actually  ad¬ 
vanced  his  parliamentary  leadership  until  Congress  tied  the  hands  of  the  Presi¬ 
dent,  and  governed  the  country  by  its  own  will,  leaving  only  perfunctory  duties 
to  be  discharged  by  the  Executive.  With  $200,000,000  of  patronage  in  his  hands 
at  the  opening  of  the  contest,  aided  by  the  active  force  of  Seward  in  the  Cabinet 
and  the  moral  power  of  Chase  on  the  bench,  Andrew  Johnson  could  not  com¬ 
mand  the  support  of  one-third  in  either  House  against  the  parliamentary  upris¬ 
ing  of  which  Thaddeus  Stevens  was  the  animating  spirit  and  the  unquestioned 
leader. 

From  these  three  great  men  Garfield  differed  radically, — differed  in  the 
quality  of  his  mind,  in  temperament,  in  the  form  and  phase  of  ambition.  He 
could  not  do  what  they  did,  but  he  could  do  what  they  could  not,  and  in  the 
breadth  of  his  Congressional  work  he  left  that  which  will  longer  exert  a 
potential  influence  among  men,  and  which,  measured  by  the  severe  test  of 
posthumous  criticism,  will  secure  a  more  enduring  and  more  enviable  fame. 

Those  unfamiliar  with  Garfield’s  industry,  and  ignorant  of  the  details  of 
his  work,  may,  in  some  degree,  measure  them  by  the  annals  of  Congress.  No 
one  of  the  generation  of  public  men  to  which  he  belonged  has  contributed  so 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


683 


much  that  will  be  valuable  for  future  reference.  His  speeches  are  numerous, 
many  of  them  brilliant,  all  of  them  well  studied,  carefully  phrased,  and  ex¬ 
haustive  of  the  subject  under  consideration.  Collected  from  the  scattered 
pages  of  ninety  royal  octavo  volumes  of  Congressional  Record,  they  would 
present  an  invaluable  compendium  of  the  political  history  of  the  most  im¬ 
portant  era  through  which  the  national  government  has  ever  passed.  When 
the  history  of  this  period  shall  be  impartially  written,  when  war  legislation, 
measures  of  reconstruction,  protection  of  human  rights,  amendments  to  the 
Constitution,  maintenance  of  public  credit,  steps  toward  specie  resumption, 
true  theories  of  revenue  maybe  reviewed,  unsurrounded  by  prejudice  and  dis¬ 
connected  from  partisanism,  the  speeches  of  Garfield  will  be  estimated  at  their 
true  value,  and  will  be  found  to  comprise  a  vast  magazine  of  fact  and  argu¬ 
ment,  of  clear  analysis,  and  sound  conclusion.  Indeed,  if  no  other  authority 
were  accessible,  his  speeches  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  from  December, 
1863,  to  June,  1880,  would  give  a  well-connected  history  and  complete  defense 
of  the  important  legislation  of  the  seventeen  eventful  years  that  constitute 
his  parliamentary  life.  Far  beyond  that,  his  speeches  would  be  *found  to 
forecast  many  great  measures  yet  to  be  completed — measures  which  he  knew 
were  beyond  the  public  opinion  of  the  hour,  but  which  he  confidently  believed 
would  secure  popular  approval  within  the  period  of  his  own  lifetime,  and  by 
the  aid  of  his  own  efforts. 

Differing,  as  Garfield  does,  from  the  brilliant  parliamentary  leaders,  it  is 
not  easy  to  find  his  counterpart  anywhere  in  the  records  of  public  life.  He 
perhaps  more  nearly  resembles  Mr.  Seward  in  his  supreme  faith  in  the  all- 
conquering  power  of  a  principle.  He  had  the  love  of  learning  and  the  patient 
industry  of  investigation,  to  which  John  Quincy  Adams  owes  his  prominence 
and  his  Presidency.  He  had  some  of  those  ponderous  elements  of  mind 
which  distinguished  Mr.  Webster,  and  which,  indeed,  in  all  our  public  life 
have  left  the  great  Massachusetts  Senator  without  an  intellectual  peer. 

In  English  parliamentary  history,  as  in  our  own,  the  leaders  in  the  House 
of  Commons  present  points  of  essential  difference  from  Garfield.  But  some 
of  his  methods  recall  the  best  features  in  the  strong,  independent  course  of 
Sir  Robert  Peel,  and  striking  resemblances  are  discernible  in  that  most  prom¬ 
ising  of  modern  conservatives,  who  died  too  early  for  his  country  and  his 
fame,  the  Lord  George  Bentinck.  He  had  all  of  Burke’s  love  for  the  sublime 
and  the  beautiful,  with,  possibly,  something  of  his  superabundance;  and  in 
his  faith  and  his  magnanimity,  in  his  power  of  statement,  in  his  subtle 
analysis,  in  his  faultless  logic,  in  his  love  of  literature,  in  his  wealth  and 
world  of  illustration,  one  is  reminded  of  that  English  statesman  of  to-day, 
who  confronted  with  obstacles  that  would  daunt  any  but  the  dauntless,  re¬ 
viled  by  those  whom  he  would  relieve  as  bitterly  as  by  those  whose  supposed 
rights  he  is  forced  to  invade,  still  labors  with  serene  courage  for  the  ameliora¬ 
tion  of  Ireland,  and  for  the  honor  of  the  English  name. 


684 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GABFIELD. 


Garfield’s  nomination  to  the  Presidency,  while  not  predicted  or  anticipated, 
was  not  a  surprise  to  the  country.  His  prominence  in  Congress,  his  solid 
qualities,  his  wide  reputation,  strengthened  by  his  then  recent  election  as 
Senator  from  Ohio,  kept  him  in  the  public  eye  as  a  man  occupying  the  very 
highest  rank  among  those  entitled  to  be  called  statesmen.  It  was  not  mere 
chance  that  brought  him  this  high  honor.  “We  must,”  says  Mr.  Emerson, 
“  reckon  success  a  constitutional  trait.  If  Eric  is  in  robust  health  and  has 
slept  well,  and  is  at  the  top  of  his  condition,  and  thirty  years  old  at  his  de¬ 
parture  from  Greenland,  he  will  steer  west,  and  his  ships  will  reach  New¬ 
foundland.  But  take  Eric  out  and  put  in  a  stronger  and  bolder  man,  and 
the  ships  will  sail  600,  1,000,  1,500  miles  further  and  reach  Labrador  and  New 
England.  There  is  no  chance  in  results.” 

As  a  candidate,  Garfield  steadily  grew  in  popular  favor.  He  was  met  with  a 
storm  of  detraction  at  the  very  hour  of  his  nomination,  and  it  continued  with  in¬ 
creasing  volume  and  momentum  until  the  close  of  his  victorious  campaign  : 

No  might  nor  greatness  in  mortality 
Can  censure  ’scape ;  backwounding  calumny 
The  whitest  virtue  strikes.  What  king  so  strong 
Can  tie  the  gall  up  in  the  slanderous  tongue  ? 

Under  it  all  he  was  calm  and  strong,  and  confident;  never  lost  his  self- 
possession,  did  no  unwise  act,  spoke  no  hasty  or  ill-considered  word.  Indeed, 
nothing  in  his  whole  life  is  more  remarkable  or  more  creditable  than  his  bear¬ 
ing  through  those  five  full  months  of  vituperation — a  prolonged  agony  of  trial 
to  a  sensitive  man,  a  constant  and  cruel  draft  upon  the  powers  of  moral  en¬ 
durance.  The  great  mass  of  these  unjust  imputations  passed  unnoticed,  and 
with  the  general  d&bris  of'the  campaign  fell  into  oblivion.  But  in  a  few  in¬ 
stances  the  iron  entered  his  soul,  and  he  died  with  the  injury  unforgotten,  if 
not  unforgiven. 

One  aspect  of  Garfield’s  candidacy  was  unprecedented.  Never  before  in 
the  history  of  partisan  contests  in  this  country  had  a  successful  Presidential 
candidate  spoken  freely  on  passing  events  and  current  issues.  To  attempt  any 
thing  of  the  kind  seemed  novel,  rash,  and  even  desperate.  The  older  class 
of  voters  recalled  the  unfortunate  Alabama  letter,  in  which  Mr.  Clay  was  sup¬ 
posed  to  have  signed  his  political  death-warrant.  They  remembered  also  the 
hot-tempered  effusion  by  which  General  Scott  lost  a  large  share  of  his  popu¬ 
larity  before  his  nomination,  and  the  unfortunate  speeches  which  rapidly  con¬ 
sumed  the  remainder.  The  younger  voters  had  seen  Mr.  Greeley  in  a  series 
of  vigorous  and  original  addresses,  preparing  the  pathway  for  his  own  defeat. 
Unmindful  of  these  warnings,  unheeding  the  advice  of  friends,  Garfield  spoke 
to  large  crowds  as  he  journeyed  to  and  from  New  York  in  August,  to  a  great 
multitude  in  that  city,  to  delegations  and  deputations  of  every  kind  that 
called  at  Mentor  during  the  summer  and  autumn.  With  innumerable  critics, 
watchful  and  eager  to  catch  a  phrase  that  might  be  turned  into  odium  or 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


685 


ridicule,  or  a  sentence  that  might  be  distorted  to  his  own  or  his  party’s  injury, 
Garfield  did  not  trip  or  halt  in  any  one  of  his  seventy  speeches.  This  seems 
all  the  more  remarkable  when  it  is  remembered  that  he  did  not  write  what  he 
said,  and  yet  spoke  with  such  logical  consecutiveness  of  thought  and  such  ad¬ 
mirable  precision  of  phrase  as  to  defy  the  accident  of  misreport  and  the 
malignity  of  misrepresentation. 

In  the  beginning  of  his  Presidential  life  Garfield’s  experience  did  not  yield 
him  pleasure  or  satisfaction.  The  duties  that  engross  so  large  a  portion  of 
the  President’s  time  were  distasteful  to  him,  and  were  unfavorably  contrasted 
with  his  legislative  work.  “  I  have  been  dealing  all  these  years  with  ideas,” 
he  impatiently  exclaimed  one  day,  “and  here  I  am  dealing  only  with  persons. 
I  have  been  heretofore  treating  of.  the  fundamental  principles  of  government, 
and  here  I  am  considering  all  day  whether  A  or  B  shall  be  appointed  to  this 
or  that  office.”  He  was  earnestly  seeking  some  practicable  way  of  correcting 
the  evils  arising  from  the  distribution  of  overgrown  and  unwieldly  patronage — 
evils  always  appreciated  and  often  discussed  by  him,  but  whose  magnitude 
had  been  more  deeply  impressed  upon  his  mind  since  his  accession  to  the 
Presidency.  Had  he  lived,  a  comprehensive  improvement  in  the  mode  of 
appointment  and  in  the  tenure  of  office  would  have  been  proposed  by  him, 
and,  with  the  aid  of  Congress,  no  doubt  perfected. 

But  while  many  of  the  executive  duties  were  not  grateful  to  him,  he  was 
assiduous  and  conscientious  in  their  discharge.  From  the  very  outset  he  ex¬ 
hibited  administrative  talent  of  a  high  order.  He  grasped  the  helm  of  office 
with  the  hand  of  a  master.  In  this  respect,  indeed,  he  constantly  surprised 
many  who  were  most  intimately  associated  with  him  in  the  government,  and 
especially  those  who  had  feared  that  he  might  be  lacking  in  the  executive 
faculty.  His  disposition  of  business  was  orderly  and  rapid.  His  power  of 
analysis,  and  his  skill  in  classification,  enabled  him  to  dispatch  a  vast  mass 
of  detail  with  singular  promptness  and  ease.  His  cabinet  meetings  were  ad¬ 
mirably  conducted.  His  clear  presentation  of  official  subjects,  his  well  con¬ 
sidered  suggestion  of  topics  on  which  discussion  was  invited,  his  quick  decision 
when  all  had  been  heard„combined  to  show  a  thoroughness  of  mental  training 
as  rare  as  his  natural  ability  and  his  facile  adaptation  to  a  new  and  enlarged 
field  of  labor. 

With  perfect  comprehension  of  all  the  inheritances  of  the  war,  with  a  cool 
calculation  of  the  obstacles  in  his  way,  impelled  always  by  a  generous  en¬ 
thusiasm,  Garfield  conceited  that  much  might  be  done  by  his  administration 
toward  restoring  harmony  between  the  different  sections  of  the  Union.  He 
was  anxious  to  go  South  and  speak  to  the  people.  As  early  as  April  he  had 
ineffectually  endeavored  to  arrange  for  a  trip  to  Nashville,  whither  he  had 
been  cordially  invited,  and  he  was  again  disappointed  a  few  weeks  later  to- 
find  that  he  could  not  go  to  South  Carolina  to  attend  the  centennial  celebra¬ 
tion  of  the  victory  of  the  Cowpens.  But  for  the  autumn  he  definitely  counted 


686 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


on  being  present  at  three  memorable  assemblies  in  the  South — the  celebration 
at  Yorktown,  the  opening  of  the  Cotton  Exposition  at  Atlanta,  and  the  meet¬ 
ing  of  the  Army  of  the  Cumberland  at  Chattanooga.  He  was  already  turning 
over  in  his  mind  his  address  for  each  occasion,  and  the  three  taken  together, 
he  said  to  a  friend,  gave  him  the  exact  scope  and  verge  which  he  needed.  At 
Yorktown  he  would  have  before  him  the  associations  of  a  hundred  years  that 
bound  the  South  and  North  in  the  sacred  memory  of  a  common  danger  and  a 
common  victory.  At  Atlanta  he  would  present  the  material  interests  and  the 
industrial  development  which  appealed  to  the  thrift  and  independence  of 
every  household,  and  which  should  unite  the  two  sections  by  the  instinct 
of  self-interest  and  self-defense.  At  Chattanooga  he  would  revive  mem¬ 
ories  of  the  war  only  to  show  that  after  all  its  disaster  and  all  its  suffering, 
the  country  was  stronger  and  greater,  the  Union  rendered  indissoluble,  and 
the  future,  through  the  agony  and  blood  of  one  generation,  made  brighter 
and  better  for  all. 

Garfield’s  ambition  for  the  success  of  his  administration  was  high.  With 
strong  caution  and  conservatism  in  his  nature,  he  was  in  no  danger  of  attempt¬ 
ing  rash  experiments  or  of  resorting  to-the  empiricism  of  statesmanship.  But 
he  believed  that  renewed  and  closer  attention  should  be  given  to  questions 
affecting  the  material  interests  and  commercial  prospects  of  50,000,000  of  peo¬ 
ple.  He  believed  that  our  continental  relations,  extensive  and  undeveloped 
as  they  are,  involved  responsibility,  and  could  be  cultivated  into  profitable 
friendship  or  be  abandoned  to  harmful  indifference  or  lasting  enmity.  He  be¬ 
lieved  with  equal  confidence  that  an  essential  forerunner  to  a  new  era  of  na¬ 
tional  progress  must  be  a  feeling  of  contentment  in  every  section  of  the 
Union,  and  a  generous  belief  that  the  benefits  and  burdens  of  government 
would  be  common  to  all.  Himself  a  conspicuous  illustration  of  what  ability 
and  ambition  may  do  under  republican  institutions,  he  loved  his  country  with 
a  passion  of  patriotic  devotion,  and  every  waking  thought  was  given  to  her 
advancement.  He  was  an  American  in  all  his  aspirations,  and  he  looked  to 
the  destiny  and  influence  of  the  United  States  with  the  philosophic  composure 
of  Jefferson  and  the  demonstrative  confidence  of  John  Adams. 

The  political  events  which  disturbed  the  President’s  serenity  for  many 
weeks  before  that  fateful  day  in  July  form  an  important  chapter  in  his  career, 
and,  in  his  own  judgment,  involved  questions  of  principle  and  of  right 
which  are  vitally  essential  to  the  constitutional  administration  of  the  Fed¬ 
eral  Government.  It  would  be  out  of  place  here  and  now  to  speak  the  lan¬ 
guage  of  controversy,  but  the  events  referred  to,  however  they  may  continue 
to  be  a  source  of  contention  with  others,  have  become,  so  far  as  Garfield  is 
concerned,  as  much  a  matter  of  history  as  his  heroism  at  Chickamauga  or  his 
illustrious  service  in  the  House.  Detail  is  not  needful,  and  personal  antago¬ 
nism  shall  not  be  rekindled  by  any  word  uttered  to-day.  The  motives  of 
those  opposing  him  are  not  to  be  here  adversely  interpreted,  nor  their  course 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


687 


harshly  characterized.  But  of  the  dead  President  this  is  to  be  said,  and  said 
because  his  own  speech  is  forever  silenced,  and  he  can  be  no  more  heard  ex¬ 
cept  through  the  fidelity  and  love  of  surviving  friends:  From  the  beginning 
to'  the  end  of  the  controversy  he  so  much  deplored,  the  President  was  never  for 
one.  moment  actuated  by  any  motive  of  gain  to  himself  or  of  loss  to  others. 
Least  of  all  men  did  he  harbor  revenge,  rarely  did  he  ever  show  resentment, 
and  malice  was  not  in  his  nature.  He  was  congenially  employed  only  in  the 
exchange  of  good  offices  and  the  doing  of  kindly  deeds. 

There  was  not  an  hour,  from  the  beginning  of  the  trouble  till  the  fatal  shot 
entered  his  body,  when  the  President  would  not  gladly,  for  the  sake  of  restor¬ 
ing  harmony,  have  retraced  any  step  he  had  taken  if  such  retracing  had 
merely  involved  consequences  personal  to  himself.  The  pride  of  consistency, 
or  any  sense  of  supposed  humiliation  that  might  result  from  surrendering  his 
position,  had  not  a  feather’s  weight  with  him.  No  man  was  ever  less  subject 
to  such  influences  from  within  or  from  without.  But  after  most  anxious  de¬ 
liberation,  and  the  coolest  survey  of  all  the  circumstances,  he  solemnly  believed 
that  the  true  prerogatives  of  the  Executive  were  involved  in  the  issue  which 
had  been  raised,  and  that  he  would  be  unfaithful  to  his  supreme  obligation  if 
he  failed  to  maintain  in  all  their  vigor  the  constitutional  rights  and  dignities 
of  his  great  office.  He  believed  this  in  all  the  convictions  of  conscience  when 
in  sound  and  vigorous  health,  and  he  believed  it  in  his  suffering  and  prostra¬ 
tion  in  the  last  conscious  thought  which  his  wearied  mind  bestowed  on  the 
transitory  struggles  of  life. 

More  than  this  need  not  be  said.  Less  than  this  could  not  be  said.  Jus¬ 
tice  to  the  dead,  the  highest  obligation  that  devolves  upon  the  living,  demands 
the  declaration  that,  in  all  the  bearings  of  the  subject,  actual  or  possible,  the 
President  was  content  in  his  mind,  justified  in  his  conscience,  immovable  in 
his  conclusions. 

The  religious  element  in  Garfield’s  character  was  deep  and  earnest.  In 
his  early  youth  he  espoused  the  faith  of  the  Disciples,  a  sect  of  that  great 
Baptist  communion  which,  in  different  ecclesiastical  establishments,  is 
so  numerous  and  so  influential  throughout  all  parts  of  the  United  States. 
But  the  broadening  tendency  of  his  mind  and  his  active  spirit  of  inquiry  were 
early  apparent,  and  carried  him  beyond  the  dogmas  of  sect  and  the  restraints 
of  association.  In  selecting  a  college  in  which  to  continue  his  education,  he 
rejected  Bethany,  though  presided  over  by  Alexander  Campbell,  the  greatest 
preacher  of  his  Church.  His  reasons  were  characteristic  :  first,  that  Bethany 
leaned  too  heavily  toward  slavery ;  and,  second,  that  being  himself  a  Disciple, 
and  the  son  of  Disciple  parents,  he  had  but  little  acquaintance  with  people  of 
other  beliefs,  and  he  thought  it  would  make  him  more  liberal,  quoting  his  own 
words,  both  in  his  religious  and  general  views,  to  go  into  a  new  circle  and  be 
under  new  influences. 

The  liberal  tendency  which  he  anticipated  as  the  result  of  wider  cult- 


688 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


ure  was  fully  realized.  He  was  emancipated  from  mere  sectarian  belief, 
and  with  eager  interest  pushed  his  investigations  in  the  direction  of  modern 
progressive  thought.  He  followed  with  quickening  step  in  the  paths  of  ex¬ 
ploration  and  speculation  so  fearlessly  trodden  by  Darwin,  by  Huxley,  by 
Tyndall,  and  by  other  living  scientists  of  the  radical  and  advanced  type. 
His  own  Church,  binding  its  disciples  by  no  formulated  creed,  but  accepting 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments  as  the  Word  of  God  with  unbiased  liberality  of 
private  interpretation,  favored,  if  it  did  not  stimulate,  the  spirit  of  investiga¬ 
tion.  Its  members  profess  with  sincerity,  and  profess  only,  to  be  of  one  mind 
and  one  faith  with  those  who  immediately  followed  the  Master,  and  who 
were  first  called  Christians  at  Antioch. 

But  however  high  Garfield  reasoned  of  “fixed  Me,  free  will,  foreknowl¬ 
edge  absolute,”  he  was  never  separated  from  the  Church  of  the  Disciples  in 
his  affections  and  in  his  associations.  For  him  it  held  the  ark  of  the  cov¬ 
enant.  To  him  it  was  the  gate  of  heaven.  The  world  of  religious  belief  is 
full  of  solecisms  and  contradictions.  A  philosophic  observer  declares  that 
men  by  the  thousand  will  die  in  defense  of  a  creed  whose  doctrines  they  do 
not  comprehend,  and  whose  tenets  they  habitually  violate.  It  is  equally 
true  that  men,  by  the  thousand,  will  cling  to  church  organizations  with  in¬ 
stinctive  and  undying  fidelity  when  their  belief,  in  maturer  years,  is  radically 
different  from  that  which  inspired  them  as  neophytes. 

But  after  this  range  of  speculation,  and  this  latitude  of  doubt,  Garfield 
came  back  always  with  freshness  and  delight  to  the  simpler  instincts  of  re¬ 
ligious  faith,  which,  earliest  implanted,  longest  survive.  Not  many  weeks 
before  his  assassination,  walking  on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac  with  a  friend, 
and  conversing  on  those  topics  of  personal  religion,  concerning  which  noble 
natures  have  an  unconquerable  reserve,  he  said  that  he  found  the  Lord’s 
Prayer,  and  the  simple  petitions  learned  in  infancy,  infinitely  restful  to  him, 
not  merely  in  their  stated  repetition,  but  in  their  casual  and  frequent  recall  as 
he  went  about  the  daily  duties  of  life.  Certain  texts  of  Scripture  had  a  very 
strong  hold  on  his  memory  and  his  heart.  He  heard,  while  in  Edinburgh, 
some  years  ago,  an  eminent  Scotch  preacher  who  prefaced  his  sermon  with 
reading  the  eighth  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  which  book  had  been 
the  subject  of  careful  study  with  Garfield  during  all  his  religious  life.  He 
was  greatly  impressed  by  the  elocution  of  the  preacher,  and  declared  that  it 
had  imparted  a  new  and  deeper  meaning  to  the  maj'estic  utterances  of  St. 
Paul.  He  referred  often,  in  after  years,  to  that  memorable  service,  and  dwelt 
with  exaltation  of  feeling  upon  the  radiant  promise  and  the  assured  hope  with 
which  the  great  apostle  of  the  Gentiles  was  “  persuaded  that  neither  death, 
nor  life,  nor  angels,  nor  principalities,  nor  powers,  nor  things  present,  nor 
things  to  come,  nor  height,  nor  depth,  nor  any  other  creature,  shall  be  able  to 
separate  us  from  the  love  of  God,  which  is  in  Christ  Jesus  our  Lord.” 

The  crowning  characteristics  of  General  Garfield’s  religious  opinions,  as, 


BLAINE’S  EULOGY  ON  GARFIELD. 


689 


indeed,  of  all  his  opinions,  was  his  liberality.  In  all  things  he  had  charity. 
Tolerance  was  of  his  nature.  He  respected  in  others  the  qualities  which  he 
possessed  himself — sincerity  of  conviction  and  frankness  of  expression.  With 
him  the  inquiry  was  not  so  much  what  a  man  believes,  but  does  he  believe  it? 
The  lines  of  his  friendship  and  his  confidence  encircled  men  of  every  creed, 
and  men  of  no  creed ;  and  to  the  end  of  his  life,  on  his  ever-lengthening  list 
of  friends,  were  to  be  found  the  names  of  a  pious  Catholic  priest  and  of  an 
honest-minded  and  generous-hearted  freethinker 

On  the  morning  of  Saturday,  July  2,  the  President  was  a  contented  and 
happy  man — not  in  an  ordinary  degree,  bu-t  joyfully,  almost  boyishly  happy. 
On  his  way  to  the  railroad  station,  to  which  he  drove  slowly,  in  conscious 
enjoyment  of  the  beautiful  morning,  with  an  unwonted  sense  of  leisure  and  a 
«keen  anticipation  of  pleasure,  his  talk  was  all  in  the  grateful  and  gratulatory 
vein.  He  felt  that  after  four  months  of  trial  his  administration  was  strong  in 
its  grasp  of  affairs,  strong  in  popular  favor,  and  destined  to  grow  stronger , 
that  grave  difficulties  confronting  him  at  his  inauguration  had  been  safely 
passed;  that  trouble  lay  behind  him  and  not  before  him  ;  that  he  was  soon  to 
meet  the  wife  whom  he  loved,  now  recovering  from  an  illness  which  had  but 
lately  disquieted  and  at  times  almost  unnerved  him ;  that  he  was  going  to  his 
Alma  Mater  to  renew  the  most  cherished  associations  of  his  young  manhood, 
and  to  exchange  greetings  with  those  whose  deepening  interest  had  followed 
every  step  of  his  upward  progress  from  the  day  he  entered  upon  his  college 
course  until  he  had  attained  the  loftiest  elevation  in  the  gift  of  his  country¬ 
men. 

Surely  if  happiness  can  ever  come  from  the  honors  or  triumphs  of  this 
world,  on  that  quiet  July  morning,  James  A.  Garfield  may  well  have  been  a 
happy  man.  No  foreboding  of  evil  haunted  him ;  no  slightest  premonition 
of  danger  clouded  his  sky.  His  terrible  fate  was  upon  him  in  an  instant. 
One  moment  he  stood  erect,  strong,  confident,  in  the  years  stretching  peace¬ 
fully  out  before  him.  The  next  he  lay  wounded,  bleeding,  helpless,  doomed 
to  weary  weeks  of  torture,  to  silence,  and  the  grave. 

Great  in  life,  he  was  surpassingly  great  in  death.  For  no  cause,  in  the 
very  frenzy  of  wantonness  and  wickedness,  by  the  red  hand  of  murder,  he 
was  thrust  from  the  full  tide  of  this  world’s  interest,  from  its  hopes,  its  aspi¬ 
rations,  its  victories,  into  the  visible  presence  of  death — and  he  did  not  quail. 
Not  alone  for  fihe  one  short  moment  in  which,  stunned  and  dazed,  he  could 
give  up  life,  hardly  aware  of  its  relinquishment,  but  through  days  of  deadly 
languor,  through  weeks  of  agony,  that  was  not  less  agony  because  silently 
borne,  with  clear  sight  and  calm  courage,  he  looked  into  his  open  grave. 
What  blight  and  ruin  met  his  anguished  eyes,  whose  lips  may  tell ! — What 
brilliant  broken  plans !  what  baffled,  high  ambitions!  what  sundering  of  strong, 
warm,  manhood’s  friendships !  what  bitter  rending  of  sweet  household  ties ! 
Behind  him  a  proud,  expectant  nation,  a  great  host  of  sustaining  friends,  a 


690 


LIFE  OF  JAMES  A.  GARFIELD. 


cherished  and  happy  mother,  wearing  the  full,  rich'  honors  of  her  early  toil 
and  tears ;  the  wife  of  his  youth,  whose  whole  life  lay  in  his ;  the  little  boys 
not  yet  emerged  from  childhood’s  day  of  frolic;  the  fair,  young  daughter; 
the  sturdy  sons  just  springing  into  closest  companionship,  claiming  every  day 
and  every  day  rewarding  a  father’s  love  and  care  ;  and  in  his  heart  the  eager, 
rejoicing  power  to  meet  all  demand.  Before  him  desolation  and  great  dark¬ 
ness!  And  his  soul  was  not  shaken.  His  countrymen  were  thrilled  with 
instant,  profound,  and  universal  sympathy.  Masterful  in  his  mortal  weak¬ 
ness,  he  became  the  center  of  a  nation’s  love,  enshrined  in  the  prayers  of  a 
world.  But  all  the  love  and  all  the  sympathy  could  not  share  with  him  his 
suffering.  He  trod  the  winepress  alone.  With  unfaltering  front  he  faced 
death.  With  unfailing  tenderness  he  took  leave  of  life.  Above  the  demoniac 
hiss  of  the  assassin’s  bullet  he  heard  the  voice  of  God.  With  simple  resigna¬ 
tion  he  bowed  to  the  divine  decree. 

As  the  end  drew  near,  his  early  craving  for  the  sea  returned.  The  stately 
mansion  of  power  had  been  to  him  the  wearisome  hospital  of  pain,  and  he 
begged  to  be  taken  from  its  prison  walls,  from  its  oppressive,  stifling  air,  from 
its  homelessness  and  its  hopelessness.  Gently,  silently,  the  love  of  a  great 
people  bore  the  pale  sufferer  to  the  longed-for  healing  of  the  sea,  to  live  or  to 
die,  as  God  should  will,  within  sight  of  its  heaving  billows,  within  sound  of 
its  manifold  voices,  with  wan,  fevered  face  tenderly  lifted  to  the  cooling  breeze, 
he  looked  out  wistfully  upon  the  ocean’s  changing  wonders, — on  its  far  sails, 
whitening  in  the  morning  light ;  on  its  restless  waves,  rolling  shoreward  to 
break  and  die  beneath  the  noonday  sun ;  on  the  red  clouds  of  evening,  arch¬ 
ing  low  to  the  horizon ;  on  the  serene  and  shining  pathway  of  the  stars.  Let 
us  think  that  his  dying  eyes  read  a  mystic  meaning  which  only  the  rapt 
and  parting  soul  may  know.  Let  us  believe  that  in  the  silence  of  the  reced¬ 
ing  world  he  heard  the  great  waves  breaking  on  a  farther  shore,  and  felt 
already  upon  his  wasted  brow  the  breath  of  the  eternal  morning. 


